AFAIK you're missing a crucial point - they're trying to require G/FB to pay out billions to old (read: dying) media publications, which will crush small publications. On the Open Web, ABC News should get the exact same treatment at JoeBloggsYT2020.
Its all the same shit.
Our media here is a joke, even our govt funded "for the people" news org is massive biased toward the liberal party.
Terrorism, climate change, the challenge to single-narrative media, gay marriage, and a number of other examples of recent societal change are shifting the ground underneath the powerful, and they're not winning 'naturally' as often as they'd like, so they're resolving to win 'unnaturally', which very quickly degenerates from a position of 'nice'.
Sky News is what it is because of chasing popularity. Unfortunately it has a suitably sized audience to maintain it's virulently ignorant and hateful narratives. It's representative of a distilled version of a Australia's hopes and dreams for the future. Oh so sadly.
Fine. Have the government pay subsidies. It's not Google's duty to fund the newspaper industry.
I legitimately don't understand this point of view. Original reporting of the kind that keeps politicians and corporations in line costs money; investigative journalists aren't cheap. What YouTuber gives you this kind of depth? Will the world be a better place without the Fourth Estate?
But then why wouldn't the money go to fund the AP Press Pool in Canberra which shutdown recently because of lack of funding[1], or to the ABC or SBS or other public journalism?
Instead it goes directly to the big publishers who cut journalists while increasing the salary of people like Andrew Bolt (who is so far removed from a journalist it is objectionable).
My underlying argument is that a strong free press must be maintained and that the reductionist argument that legitimate news sources and JoeRandomYouTuber should be treated identically is naive at best.
> Instead it goes directly to the big publishers who cut journalists while increasing the salary of people like Andrew Bolt (who is so far removed from a journalist it is objectionable).
The relationship between the rise of populist/sensationalist media and that of the Internet/social media/Google is inextricably linked. Traditional news sources found their revenue declining and so chased whatever attracted consumers, including sensationalist cretins like Bolt. Google should accept responsibility for this.
To be clear, I'm not arguing that the ACCC's proposal is the perfect solution to the underlying problem, but the status quo does need to change. At least they're doing something.
Well the flow of money is the source of pretty key in enabling a strong, free press.
> My underlying argument is that a strong free press must be maintained and that the reductionist argument that legitimate news sources and JoeRandomYouTuber should be treated identically is naive at best.
Sure.
So there should be some kind of non-discriminatory rules that allow new players to find a voice as well as maintaining credible news sources.
> Traditional news sources found their revenue declining and so chased whatever attracted consumers, including sensationalist cretins like Bolt. Google should accept responsibility for this.
Well I agree that the news ecosystem has changed, and I agree that a strong and free press has value.
> At least they're doing something.
See I don't see this as a good thing at all. I see this as making the problem worse by funding players who are some of the worse examples.
Can someone explain what this means?
> providing information about how and when Google and Facebook make available user data collected through users’ interactions with news content.
Is it saying google or facebook need to tell news publication about when/which users are accessing thier content?
A quote from the Q&A seems to clarify:
> give news media businesses clear information about the nature and availability of user data collected through users’ interactions with news on their services;
[1] https://www.accc.gov.au/system/files/ACCC%20-%20Mandatory%20...